Early Life in Buffalo, NY (1916-1936)

Title

Early Life in Buffalo, NY (1916-1936)

Description

This collection includes information about Hofstadter's childhood and early career in Buffalo, NY. Items include images and documents from his years as a high school student and as an undergraduate at the University of Buffalo. This collection will be of particular relevance to those who are interested in historiography and radical student politics during the Great Depression.

Collection Items

High School Commencement Program
Program for Hofstadter's commencement ceremony, Fosdick-Masten Park High School, June, 1933.

High School Yearbook Photo
Yearbook photograph of Richard Hofstadter in the Fosdick-Masten Park High School Chronicle, 1933.

H. L. Mencken at his typewriter in Baltimore Sun office, 1913
Portrait photograph taken in 1913 of a young H. L. (Henry Louis) Mencken working at his typewriter in the Baltimore Sun office. He holds a corncob pipe in his hand. The Sun offices were then located in a building on…

One-act play
A one-act play written by Richard Hofstadter while a high school student in Buffalo, NY.

University Scholarship Certificate, September 1933
Certificate announcing Richard Hofstadter's scholarship award for his university education.

"The Tariff and Homestead Issues in the Republican Platform of 1860"
Richard Hofstadter's senior thesis, written at the University of Buffalo, May, 1936.

Letter from Charles A. Beard
Letter from Charles A. Beard, written May 8, 1944, congratulating Hofstadter for his article, "U.B. Phillips and the Plantation Legend," which appeared in the April 1944 issue of The Journal of Negro History.

National Student League membership application form, 1935.
National Student League membership application form, 1935. Richard Hofstadter headed the University of Buffalo chapter of the organization that year.

Anti-ROTC Petition, 1935
National Student League petition against Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) programs on college campuses, 1935. That year, Richard Hofstadter headed the NSL strike publicity committee at the University of Buffalo and helped to coordinate the…

Students Fight War
Front page of a National Student League anti-war pamphlet, 1935.
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